Good afternoon, committee members.
Listen, I hope no one asks me about policy 8.2.630, because I think I'm the only one appearing today who's not a lawyer. It's also my pleasure to note that I'm not--thank you--the only Shaw here today.
We're a large provider of cable services, with some three million customers, including our satellite base. We are busy and active in direct-to-home, cable TV, and VoIP. We're the largest Internet provider in western Canada right now. Last week we brought VoIP competition for the first time to a town called Medicine Hat. Today we launched in a town called Lethbridge. Next week we'll launch in a town called Red Deer. All three towns have never seen competition at any time in Canada's telecommunications history and yet have seen a lot of broadcast competition across the board.
We have a couple of ideas of what we think would be good, what I'll call “work ahead” ideas for the committee to consider as we roll forward.
Currently only two million of our customers have the availability of voice-over-Internet phone, or digital phone, as we call it. We have a long way to go and are actively pursuing that competition. We still have competitors--TELUS, SaskTel, Manitoba Tel--that have four million lines, and we're only talking about homes passed, with the 170,000 customers we have to date.
We believe we don't need a lot of time to establish competition; we need just a bit. We're more of the component that one year would be a good timeframe for substantial competition--let you guys pick the date for when it happens--so that small towns in Canada get the competition. Only the big towns have it right now.
At this time, the monopoly telcos totally manage and run the system. It's hard for us to arrange number portability. It's hard for us, as Ken Engelhart pointed out, to access support structures and rights of way. We're told constantly they're full, or will be used for their future facilities down the road. We really need it to be clear that one priority we have is access to provide Canadians....
Shaw is a company that serves a lot of small towns, whether it's in British Columbia or Manitoba, such as Prince Albert or Moose Jaw or Swift Current--I call it “Speedy Creek”--or other places like that. We need access, and if we don't have some kind of ability to ensure that we can bring the competition there, it's going to be really awkward for us. That's all we're saying. So if that's the whole mandate, that's what we'd really like you to consider.
We also think that broadcasting needs a change. We know it's not the mandate here today, but I think any kind of guidance that you or this committee could give to help Canadians have a further choice in Canada would be greatly accepted by all constituents of all parties here today.
As we see everything go down to iPods and digital television, with everything accelerating--get 'em any way you can--Canadians are forced to be limited by restrictions they're not used to. People from western Canada go to California, or Hawaii, and watch a show. They come back. They can't watch the show. They phone me and ask, “Jim, why can't I watch the show?” I say, “Well, have you seen the broadcasting book? It's about that thick, and it has more rules than you've ever seen.” I can't even explain it to them. So that's part of the issue.
I think it's the same thing in telecom. We need to boil it down and have a healthy broadcasting system that responds to what Canadians want. It's the same thing on the telecom side. You will always have competition....
Just one second, Mr. Chair. Sorry, but these are important.
If we keep Canadians on our side, we will always win, and these big companies will roll on.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.